Currently, when a member of the crew of an aircraft defines a flight plan, he can either manually define each of the waypoints of the trajectory or define all of a trajectory predefined in the flight management of the aircraft. The waypoint is notably defined by a latitude and a longitude corresponding to its position in space. The waypoints are generally stored in a navigation database. The flight management of an aircraft uses the navigation database, in particular the waypoint data, in order to define the trajectory of the aircraft. The flight management of an aircraft is generally called FMS, standing for “Flight Management System”.
Currently, the flight plan makes it possible notably to check that the aircraft is adhering to the planned path in automatic mode. These days, if there is an inconsistency between the position of a waypoint and the trajectory of the flight plan, for example if a waypoint is abnormally distanced from the trajectory of the flight plan, there is no means envisaged to warn the crew of this inconsistency. It may in this case be the result of a desire to fly a particular path comprising one or more misalignments desired by the crew, but it can also be the result of human error in defining the waypoints in the flight plan.
Because of this, in the case of a misalignment of a waypoint that is not desired by the crew, the latter therefore being the result of human error, the current solutions do not eliminate ambiguity or inconsistency from the flight plan.
The major drawback of the absence of misalignment control lies in that a human error can occur when entering a flight plan into the FMS. Moreover, fuel consumption is greater and travel times longer.